Heating Degree-days

 

A heating degree-day is basically a measure of how cold it has been.

 

When heating a space, fuel demand varies according to how cold it is.  Degree-day units were developed to help in estimating the heat requirements and fuel costs for a building.

 

When the outside air is above a certain temperature no heat is required.  This is what we refer to as a base temperature.  65º F is used as the base temperature for calculating heating degree-days.

 

If you take the average daily temperature and subtract it from 65º F you can determine your degree-days.  Each degree accounts for one degree-day.

 

If today’s High temperature is 50º F and the Low is 30º F our average daily temperature is 40º F. Subtract 40º F from 65º F and you will see that there are 25 degree-days for today.

 

Heating costs are directly proportional to the number of degree-days in a year.

 

 

 

Heating Degree Days
DD JAN FEB MAR APR MAY JUN JUL AUG SEP OCT NOV DEC Total
1996 883 733 597 254 27 2 0 0 36 151 542 647 3,872
1997 815 501 294 271 102 8 0 0 2 213 580 791 3,577
1998 621 557 494 201 20 6 0 0 2 104 359 639 3,003
1999 645 516 563 116 9 0 0 0 34 153 343 619 2,998
2000 780 480 303 239 10 4 0 0 36 121 515 1041 3,529
2001 867 514 563 116 9 2 0 0 62 213 278 571 3,195
2002 700 708 467 156 113 1 0 0 1 143 539 729 3,557
2003 982 715 424 191 48 11 0 0 51 216 389 830 3,857
2004 883 738 406 247 53 2 0 19 27 105 393 817 3,690
2005 685 595 541 234 115 0 0 0 8 233 406 839 3,656
2006 553 667 442 90 63 0 0 0 49 274 475 597 3,210
2007 691  719 265  279 32 0  0 0 7 137  473 542 3,145
2008 791  583  413 223  65 0             2,072
                         
Usage in MCF (Thousand Cubic Feet)
MCF JAN FEB MAR APR MAY JUN JUL AUG SEP OCT NOV DEC Total
1996 396,208 347,479 311,707 210,115 132,700 107,532 110,116 99,736 112,343 160,121 290,606 322,951 2,601,614
1997 382,058 296,177 217,816 205,651 135,413 112,437 90,952 97,729 104,819 179,400 299,786 396,331 2,518,569
1998 355,856 325,742 308,584 178,376 116,767 102,114 85,728 93,641 81,295 119,486 211,904 316,395 2,295,888
1999